I know you've all been pretty antsy for the next round, but your wait is over! Use this thread to nominate suspects to be banned from Standard LC play. A few things to remember:

1. You can nominate as many suspects as possible, provided you give good reasoning. Please Bold the Pokemon you nominate as Suspects.
2. While we will not be imposing a limitation on the number of Suspects you choose to nominate, we ask you to keep it to a reasonable number of nominations in your post.
3. Use your own reasoning and not something like "I believe that Swablu is Uber because Vader says so".
4. You can't nominate against a Pokemon, that is, you can't say "I don't want Krabby to be a Suspect".
5. Do not reply to other people's posts in this topic.
6. Depending on the quality of your arguments, your vote might not be counted. However, votes will be evaluated on a less technical, more common-sense basis than in previous Suspect nominations.
7. Only make one post. Edit all your Suspect nominations into that post.
8. Any posts that aren't nominating suspects will be deleted.
9. If you have any questions, please PM Dubulous or Vader.
10. Votes will not be counted until after this thread is closed.
11. Don't be afraid to nominate Pokemon that have already been nominated.
12. It is an acceptable vote to bold vote "no Suspects". If you believe strongly that there are no Suspects in the current LC metagame, you may vote for no Pokemon to be Suspects.

I strongly believe that everything in LC is counterable as long as you build your team correctly. Sun is easily stopped by priority and any weather change, as well as being walled by some common Pokemon (Munchlax). Zuruggu can be countered by revenge killers, priority and things like CMKrow with Featherdance. Speaking of which, Krow does have many viable sets, but a mis-predict doesn't result in an automatic KO and loss like everyone's been claiming. Meditite is also held back by Evo Stone, preventing it from doing the damage it used to. Finally, Evo Stone itself is a fantastic addition to the LC metagame, and it is in no way broken. To say it levels the playing field would be a slight stretch.

I'm not proposing your standard LO Meditite. I'm proposing Evolution Stone Meditite. Evolution Stone Meditite easily avoids being OHKOed by Pokemon such as Gligar and still easily KOes them in turn. He still hits like a monster with 28 Attack, and to make matters worse, he has Drain Punch to keep him self at full health. Very few Pokemon can reliably switch into Meditite with Ice Punch / Drain Punch / [2 of ThunderPunch, Zen Headbutt, or Bullet Punch], even keeping in mind that he can use four at time. Without ThunderPunch, Slowpoke can counter it decently. Without Zen Headbutt, bulky Missy does ok. Bullet Punch gives it excellent priority capabilities if needed.

I know fully well that each and every set Murkrow can run is completely stoppable. However, I do not think the centralization it brings is healthy for the metagame. There are just so many sets like CMFeatherDance, CM 2 Attacks, MixKrow, SubKrow etc. which also wreak a lot of havoc when given a single turn. WOrse still, the CMFeatherDance set has only 2 checks, and they're sitting ducks for MixKrow. The amount of mindgames it creates is incredible, but they aren't positive. If your opponent brings in the right check, you just switch out Murkrow to another Pokemon who threatens the check and give that Pokemon a free turn. If your opponent brings in an incorrect check, you manage to rout his team pretty easily, or at the very least manage to cause massive dents before going down. Thus I feel Murkrow fulfills the Offensive and Support Characteristic of being an Uber(even though we're not using them anymore, I still think that they significantly contribute towards a Pokemon being Uber). In conclusion, I feel Murkrow should be made a suspect not because it is "uncheckable", but because it has amazing versatility, and overcentralizes the metagame into aiming to check it, which I feel is unhealthy for the general metagame.

This is the only real suspect that i feel is broken this round. Murkrow has such an insane movepool, and even sets which run similar moves like Calm Mind have different counters which means that as soon as Murkrow comes in and you switch to your counter, you run an extremely large chance of either losing a Pokemon for free or getting swept when you switched in the wrong Pokemon. The sheer amount of sets that Murkrow can run all have different checks and when you switch in the wrong mon, your team gets ruined. Destiny warrior said a lot of what i wanted to say, but the metagame right now seems far too over-centralized towards checking Murkrow, which honestly isn't a metagame people will want to play.

Murkrow
Murkrow deserves to be suspect simply because it can run so many different things. MixKrow has perfect coverage, and a priority move with 120bp, which is pretty dangerous for just one set. On top of that, Calm Mind Krow has a whole new use, and has a whole new set of counters. SubKrow is a whole other story. Substitute and a powerhouse Sucker Punch is a deadly combination. And most pokes that resist Sucker Punch get hit like a truck from Brave Bird. It really is a chore just to break a Sub, let alone kill it. It's great that Murkrow is so diverse. It's just that it pulls off every set a little too good is what makes it broken.

I know people say "That is pokemon, get counters" but Murkrow forces players to pick from a select group of pokes to counter it, which removes an element of variety from the metagame.

Zurrugu
Zurrugu is dangerous because it uses alot of pokes in the metagame as setup bait. It also forces you to run 1 or more counters. Dokkora or Gligar doesn't work because Zurrugu can run Zen Headbutt or Ice Punch, making both would-be counters a risk. Those are two of it's main counters, and they aren't always reliable. Outside of Gligar/Dokkora, there is Evo Stone Meditite, CM Murkrow, and a fast scarfer if it's only got one DD up.

As with Murkrow, Zurrugu confines the metagame to a selet group of pokes, which is why i think it needs to go.

Murkrow
I think Murkrow is currently the most blatantly broken thing in Little Cup. It reminds me a lot of 4th gen Salamence in that it can run a variety of sets to take advantage of different elements of the metagame. Subkrow, MixKrow, and CM Krow all have different counters and you never know if the counter you are sending in is right for the set. Murkrow is just to diverse and is, in my mind, clearly broken.

Drought
Sure sun has counters but that doesn't take away from the fact that it is extremely powerful. If you don't carry weather or a counter specifically designed to take on sun then you will have a tough time weathering the attacks of a well built sun team. I am not 100% sure if it is broken, but so far most of what I have seen has pointed to it being overpowered. Sun at least deserves to be looked at, and maybe something like Aldaron's proposal for Chlorophyll would work if sun was deemed broken.

Drought
Of course sun is counterable, but most of its counters are defeated by the team itself. Snover is destroyed by anything Fire, Hippo is destroyed by anything Grass (and yes, some teams carry Leaf Storm/Giga Drain just for Hippo). Lickitung is destroyed by Fighting-types, everything that checks sun is easily checked back by sun. I wouldn't call it "broken," as some Pokemon can beat it, but Sleep Powder and stuff make it hard to cope with. Having two Pokemon on your team devoted to check sun is completely rediculous.

It really reminds me a lot of Gen 4 OU Salamence... but vastly more diverse and threatening. It can effectively run a mixed offensive set with 19 Speed 18 Attack, 16 Special Attack and enough coverage to 2HKO everything in the metagame. The few pokemon able to take its physical moves, such as Gligar and Bronzor, get raped by Special moves like Hidden Power Ice and Heat Wave. A lot of people seem to think that the introduction on Evolution Stone has increased the defensive capabilities of LC pokemon enough to take Murkrow's attacks, and while that's true to an extent, its not quite enough. As if that wasn't bad enough, with access to Evolution Stone, and Mischievous Heart, Roost, Calm Mind and FeatherDance, even Murkrow's shitty defenses become stupidly hard to break through as it sets up multiple Calm Minds. To make matters even worse, the pokemon that can beat one set, always lose to the other, making switching into Murkrow safely virtually impossible. I haven't had the opportunity of playing in a Murkrow-less metagame, but I'm quite certain it would be a much better one.

Vulpix / Drought (I hate the idea if banning parts of pokemon...)

After playing a couple matches on the Smogon server, and comparing it to my laddering experience on the main server (where Vulpix is banned), I'm convinced Drought is unhealthy for the metagame. Yes, it has hard counters, like RestTalk Lickitung and Swablu, but they're overspecialized and have very limited use outside of stopping sun. The metagame without Vulpix is far more enjoyable and diverse, as you aren't as restricted when it comes to teambuilding. Yeah, perma-Sand and perma-Hail exist, but Hippopotas loses to Grass- moves and Snover loses to Fire- moves, which are conveniently the two most used offensive typed moves on sun teams. Drought is simply unhealthy for the metagame.

Mixkrow 2hkoes the meta and is hard to revenge because it has the most powerful priority in LC. Featherdance krow sets up on dragon dancers. Both are too good for the meta, and not knowing which it is when it switches in is even worse.

Meditite

It 2hkoes the meta and has powerful priority. 28 attack is unreal, it doesn't even need the power of a life orb to kill stuff (not that it minds it of course!). Actually runs a pretty neat scarf set that doesn't get much love too. Basically, it hits way too hard.

He has many viable sets that he can run and an extensive movepool to back it all up. Each set has different counters as well. He hits 19 Speed, and his Mixed set lets him deal with the counters to his other sets (Magnemite or Gligar for example). His defenses may be terrible, but by giving him an Evolution Stone, they aren't that bad. When his ability of Mischievous Heart used in conjunction with moves such as FeatherDance, Roost, Calm Mind, and Substitute, he is able to wall most of what could potentially threaten him. If a team doesn't have a specific counter to his set, which isn't instantly known, they rely on luck to beat him. He makes the metagame centralized and limits the amount of diversity and strategy used. Murkrow is too unpredictable and centralizing, and is unhealthy for the metagame.

At this moment in time I strongly believe Little Cup has a stable metagame where no Pokemon dominate or break it. Every poke and playstyle (Drought offence being an example) so far has hard counters and can be dealt with on many different ways. In the past few months the metagame has been stabilising and everything has been falling into place nicely.

Social Media Chief

Murkrow is easily the most threatening Pokemon in little cup right now. It's sheer unpredictability allows it to run through teams that don't over prepare for it. However, what arguably makes it worse is that it can easily check most of the other suspects that have been mentioned in this thread! It is easily one of the only Pokemon holding Meditite/Scraggy back, meaning the metagame is completely centralized around it. I sincerely believe that Murkrow is the one (and only) Pokemon that needs to be banned from Little Cup at this point.

Murkrow
It pulls off a bunch of sets, they have different checks and counters, not knowing which one it is makes for a dead pokemon or a set up Murkrow, and both of those aren't good things to be fighting. You have to run two or three Murkrow checks/counters to avoid being beaten by one, and if you guess wrong, bad things happen. I don't want battles to be won and lost on guessing what Murkrow set the opponent is running, I don't want team building to be so influenced by the many things it can do. So I posted this here.

There are some larger threats such as Zuruguu and Murkrow, but they aren't impossible to counter, and can be dealt with. As long as the team is built correctly with checks to common threats, there isn't really a Pokemon that stands out as broken. Drought is also annoying, but again, isn't impossible to counter. I believe that the current metagame is pretty balanced, and I do not think there are any suspects at this given time.

Of course, every tier has it's share of major threats. However, I believe Murkrow is just too hard to counter when it is used with it's DW ability. With the Roost / HP Dark / CM / Featherdance set, the only thing that counters it is Gligar due to it's Hyper Cutter ability. When paired up with Wynaut, this Murkrow set can sweep multiple teams. I feel that the metagame would be a lot more entertaining if we didn't have to worry about how we should fit a Murkrow counter into the team. It seems that you would have to find a way to lure out Wynaut, kill it, wait till Murkrow comes in, kill that with Gligar before the game can truly begin. Of course, all that ranting above just labels one set, there are many other unpredictable sets that Murkrow can use due to Mischievous Heart. That unpredictability makes it extremely diffucult for other players to do well in the tier. I've seen people get up high on the LC leaderboard not because their skilled, but because they are overabusing Murkrow.

At this moment in time I strongly believe Little Cup has a stable metagame where no Pokemon dominate or break it. Every poke and playstyle (Drought offence being an example) so far has hard counters and can be dealt with on many different ways. In the past few months the metagame has been stabilising and everything has been falling into place nicely.

Murkrow has gotten only buffs since we saw it banned in Gen 4 LC. First it got Brave Bird, which gave it a great new STAB option where before it could manage nothing more than Drill Peck. It kept its Sucker Punch, the strongest priority in Little Cup. While Evolution Stone keeps it more in check as far as all-out offensive variations, the Calm Mind set finds itself beating just about everything that would check an offensive Life Orb set. The gain of Mischievous Heart of course made this possible. Even the few and far between checks and counters to either of these sets can be dispatched by carrying a simple Hidden Power Ice or Heat Wave, then proceed to beat things down again with repeated Brave Birds. There's just really not a true answer to Murkrow that I have found yet, as well as my experience with the simplicity of sweeping teams with Murkrow.

EDIT: ShinyAzelf, rule 5 reminder. Take this to the discussion thread or irc :)

Little Cup Co-Leader

With the vast amount of sets that are extremely hard to counter, its no surprise to me that it should be a suspect. CM sets are extremely hard to counter and you are forced to rely on a few Pokemon to check it. Mixed sets are even worse and you have to predict correctly or it will destroy your team.

Murkrow can run a seemingly endless number of sets, and every single one is extremely dangerous. Even worse, it's impossible to figure out which set murkrow is running on the switch-in, and still difficult to determine in the turns after. For example, if it finishes off one of your mons with brave bird or sucker punch, you can't know if its mixkrow, subroost, etc. All of its sets can be countered, but they are still very dangerous even with the counter still in play. An uninvested +2 HP flying or dark is a guaranteed 2HKO on 76/76 evo stone Gligar. Normally I would hesitate to use calcs after 2 turns of set up, but Murkrow's unpredictability combined with evolution stone makes it very easy to set up multiple times. Gligar's uninvested stone edge fails to OHKO max hp evo stone Murkrow after rocks, meaning even with a counter to murkrow, if you don't guess its set immediately Murkrow will beat its common checks.

Numerous number of extremely diverse sets make Murkrow terribly hard to predict and check. It can work from one end of the spectrum by running a powerful LO set with BB and Sucker Punch, while also being able to run a threatening CM set, as most of us are aware of. This puts the opponent at a very big disadvantage and if they guess the set wrong, it could spell game over.

Meditite

Basically impossible to switch into unless you know its exact set, or are running Slowbro. 28 Attack is insane, and when coupled with LO and priority, Meditite can punch some massive holes in teams. Evo Stone barely remedies this as most stall mons are still 2HKOd by any one of its moves. Basically, I don't want to have to run Slowbro on every team.

After a DD, Evo stone Zurrugu isn't 2HKO'd by 99% of the metagame and with D-Punch/Ice Punch/Zen Headbutt it has perfect coverage over all of it's counters. It also outspeeds everything after a single DD and OHKO's all but a select few of pokemon, most of which can't do anything back. The only possible counters are essentially Dokkora which has problems if it has Zen Headbutt (CS Scarf outspeeds but doesn't OHKO, CB doesn't outspeed and doesn't OHKO with Mach Punch, LO has neither power or speed, evo stone doesn't help it survive it's attacks) Therefore I feel you need a whole team based around stopping Zuruggu, as with shed skin it doesn't even fall to status inflicters. So centralising it's crazy.

I want to add thatMurkrow is kind of broken. It can be likened to Extremekiller Arceus. It hits ridiculously hard, has a STAB base 80 power priority move (although Sucker Punch is kinda different), has great bulk with an evo stone, and has access to priority healing. It can hit with Brave Bird for a ton of damage on pretty much anything, and anything that outspeeds it is usually OHKO'd by STAB Sucker Punch. Some bulkier Evo Stone pokemon can take one or two hits, but that's just a chance for Murkrow to set up a Sub or Roost. And it is so unpredictable that it is hard to tell what to send out against it. Pokemon like Slowpoke can kind of outlast a Brave Bird barrage, but die to the CM set (and trust me, Slowpoke can't take too many Brave Birds either). If Murkrow opts for Mischievious Heart, it has priority Taunt, Substitute, and Roost. If it opts for Insomnia, it can't be put to sleep and has much more coverage with moves like Heat Wave. If it opts for Super Luck, it can ignore defense boosts and almost every hit is a critical hit with moves like Night Slash and Air Cutter (believe me, Scope Lense Air Cutter Night Slash is a terror). It's extremely bulky with an Evo Stone, too powerful with a Life Orb, and can't die with an Oran Berry. People say that Komatana is a good counter for it, but it's hard to tell when it's safe to use it. Murkrow may carry Heat Wave, and you can't tell until Komatana's already dead. In short, Murkrow is unpredictable, impossible to kill, and way too powerful for LC.

Click to expand...

Drought/Vulpix
Drought is terrible for the metagame because of everything kokoloko said. It's powerful, too hard to counter, and the metagame is more enjoyable and diverse without it. Those of you who said that Hippopotas and Snover counter sun, have you realized that pretty much every pokemon on a sun team carries either a grass or fire move? The sun also makes Growth more dangerous, as it gives the opponenet a swords dance and nasty plot in one turn. Combined with chlorophyl, your opponent is running around with +2 Atk, +2 SAtk, and +2 Spe (and possibly +1 Def and +1 SDef from an evo stone). If you think about it, with an evo stone, sun sweepers can get +1 in every stat and an additional +1 in all of the sweeping stats. Most of these pokemon are resistant to fighting priority, so Dokkora and Croagunk aren't going to work here. The fact is, Sun teams can eliminate their counters easily, can set up easily to blow through evo stone pokemon, are too fast to be killed, and really aren't hit hard by priority. Drought cannot stay in this metagame. Drought sweepers are not stopped by Snover at all. Pretty much ever sun team pokemon has a fire attack of some sort, and Snover is not going to want to switch into any of those. Snover is pretty much a free switch in for any fire type (including Vulpix) who can maim it, then continue sweeping. Swablu may have its uses in stopping sun teams, but it's not going to be able to take boosted attacks from Growth sweepers and has pretty much no use outside of countering sun. Lickitung has its uses, but I'm not going to put six Lickitungs on my team. The part about sun being so easy to counter is just wrong. I'm sorry, but there are no switch ins, no pokemon that outspeed, and no survivors. And Dokkora won't have such an easy time using Mach Punch against Poison types like Bellsprout, and won't like taking a +2 Solarbeam to the face afterwards. I've said this before: Evo Stone Bellsprout has the following boosts after just one Growth: +2 Atk, +1 Def, +2 SAtk, +1 SDef, +2 Spe. Now stack that on top of a STAB 120 BP move, healing with Giga Drain, and boosted Hidden Power Fires.

Hits the famous 19 speed benchmark outspeeding most of the tier without a scarf (the 20 speeders aren't even that common either), has great attacking stats, good typing, is bulky with Evolution Stone, very good movepool (Brave Bird, Sucker Punch, Heat Wave, Taunt, FeatherDance, Calm Mind, Roost, etc.), very versatile.

The big problem set in my opinion is probably the Evo Stone / Life Orb + Brave Bird set.

Everything takes a huge chunk out of Brave Bird, but the main things that don't exactly take that much are Gligar, Ferroseed, Slowpoke, Frillish, whom are all countered by the respective above moves. Almost nothing can switch in without taking a chunk of their life off, whilst Murkrow can at least take a hit and usually it heal it off. Substitute blocks Will-O-Wisp and other status and gets priority with MH, along with Roost. Maybe HP Fighting for Pawniard if you're really worried about him.

CM FD Roost HP Fly/Dark set is only countered by Hyper Cutter Gligar, Competitive Spirit Pawniard, Toxic users, and Critical Hits. The previous two can all be countered by a simple mixKrow set utilizing Heat Wave/HP Ice somewhere on there, or even by the set above. Speaking of which, all out mixkrow with roost has devastating power 1-2HKOing pretty much everything in the tier, with the exception of something like Lickitung who usually doesn't do much back.

In a nut shell it is very powerful, has decent bulk along with good typing, very versatile in destroying counters for its sets with other just as good sets, and Mischevious Heart is probably the kicker.

It reaches 21 / 18 / 18 Defenses, 28 Attack, 15 Speed, which is crazy to say the least. It isn't OHKOd by hardly anything aside from things like a Gastly Shadow Ball. 1-2HKOs so many things such as 2HKOing max/max +def nature Slowpoke with ThunderPunch a handful of times (especially with residual damage). Drain Punch heals Meditite making it even harder and more ridiculous to kill. Despite not having stab on BP, coming off a 28 Attack stat hurts so many things really hard. Nothing can really switch into it without having to predict very carefully.

On a side note it takes about 70% from a Dragon Danced Scraggy Crunch, so it makes a very good check for it killing it with Drain Punch and healing back most of its HP.

Scraggy (Zuruggu)

Everyone knows the problem set, stupid DD and any stupid combination of Drain Punch, Crunch, Ice Punch, and Zen Headbutt, while holding a stupid evo stone. One Dragon Dance and it will be able to sweep an entire team a lot of the times. Near impossible to kill because of it healing back hp with Drain Punch and its ridiculous defenses. Crazy coverage and nothing is really a full stop to it, besides bizarre (near useless except for stopping Scraggy) Pokemon like Unaware Wooper. Most checks/counters to it are pretty much dead after stopping it.

Different EVs tailored to add more Speed, Attack, Defenses, or utilizing Moxie over Shed Skin to help make the sweep near unstoppable after being set up, can make all the difference in defeating opponents last ditch effort in stopping a Scraggy sweep. Scraggy almost always takes one, if not many, Pokemon down with it.

So in other-words, cheap one-turn set up that is ridiculously easy to set up (especially since Shed Skin has become the common ability people are reluctant to Will-O-Wisp now and even if they do, you probably have Shed Skin :P), and ridiculously easy to sweep with.